Women at Scientific Institution Face Gender Discrimination

Salk Institute is considered a haven for scientific research and is known for employing scientific legends. However, recent lawsuits indicate that Salk Institute is guilty of gender discrimination. A female biochemist worked at Salk Institute for over 30 years. However, after her contract with the institute expired, she was forced to shut down her experiments. To renew her contract, she was required to accumulate enough funds to cover half of her salary. Despite not being able to accomplish this goal, she believed that her participation in state-filed gender-discrimination lawsuits were partially responsible for her termination. The biochemist and two other female professors filed the lawsuits due to the unfair treatment of female faculty.

In particular, the women claimed that Salk Institute enforced laboratory restrictions on female researchers. While women had inadequate access to funds, it was alleged that male faculty received private donations. Similarly, women received promotions at slower rates than men, despite collecting more research grants. They also received a lower salary than their male counterparts. The women also claimed that Salk Institute encouraged them to downsize their labs. According to the Los Angeles Times, female faculty members were responsible for four out of the five smallest labs in the institute. Similarly, less than half of the faculty consisted of women. This statistic indicates discrimination, since females primarily dominate the biological science field.

Alongside the gender discrimination lawsuit, Salk Institute also dealt with sexual harassment allegations against one of their leading researchers. Eight women alleged that a male doctor sexually harassed the female staff. Many claims indicated that this doctor had a history of forcibly kissing women, pinching buttocks, and grabbing breasts. Despite denying the claims, he eventually resigned from the institute. In November 2018, Salk Institute settled the three discrimination lawsuits. Two out of the three women returned to the institute as faculty members.

What Classifies as Gender Discrimination?

To fight gender discrimination, it is important to stay informed. One should be aware of common gender discrimination tactics, which include:

• Pay inequality
• Being unable to advance in your career due to your gender
• Pregnancy discrimination
• Parental status discrimination
• Unfair treatment of a gender
• Unequal benefits between both genders
• Sexual harassment or abuse

Cherry Hill Employment Lawyers at Sidney L. Gold & Associates, P.C. Advocate for Victims of Gender Discrimination in the Workplace

If you or a loved one was discriminated at work, please consider contacting a Cherry Hill employment lawyer at Sidney L. Gold & Associates, P.C. Our lawyers work closely with clients to obtain the best possible legal outcomes. If you are interested in speaking to one of our lawyers, contact us online or call us at 215-569-1999 for a free consultation. Located in Pennsauken, New Jersey, we proudly serve clients throughout South Jersey.